


tore you open, till the end

by MythologicalHoe



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Angst, Dark Rey (Star Wars), Dark Siders Being Distorted by The Force, Empress Rey, Eventual Smut, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Humor, Gaslighting, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Inappropriate Use of the Force, Jedi Ben Solo, Mental Health Issues, Non-Linear Narrative, Rewrite, Rewrite of a Fic I wrote, Snoke is bad, The Dark Side of the Force, There Are Some Mentions Of Child Grooming and Other Abuse, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-02
Updated: 2019-02-03
Packaged: 2019-10-20 20:27:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,046
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17629106
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MythologicalHoe/pseuds/MythologicalHoe
Summary: Rey is the Empress of the First Order. She's in the middle of the war with the Resistance when she gets hit by a log trap and nearly killed. A 'kind samaritan' finds her and nurses her back to health.





	1. through red eyes

**Author's Note:**

> This is a rewrite of a fic I wrote, tbh I think it's a lot better

 

**_Five Years Ago_ **

The air hung heavy with the smell of ash and copper. There was a sort of peace in the land, with blackened grass and toppled over trees.  _It’s a damn shame,_ some things were still on fire. The wildlife and brush around the campsite around the rebel hide out was all but gone at this point, and one girl was faced with a sea of bodies. Perhaps she should feel bad about this happening. Twenty soldiers were dead, twenty soldiers that probably had children that they had to deal with. But Snoke would be pleased. Rey shuffled through the dead, occasionally her interest would pique when she saw someone important and she would rifle through the things.

“Always the scavenging rat,” Brendol Hux would say when he saw her out and about, “don’t associate with her kind, Armitage. Not if it can be helped.” Rey used to hate Armitage Hux as much as she hated any other boy that was in the academy. It didn’t take her long to find out that he didn’t really like the situation that he was in either. Rey often saw bruises on his knees and thighs and sometimes on his face. They weren’t the kind that came from the brawls that he would get into with others. These were the kind that were inflicted by someone, much much bigger than him. She knew for a fact that it was Brendol who would inflict such wounds to him. 

That day Brendol wasn’t there though, and Armitage walked out into the middle of a massacre. “You know, sometimes you’re almost terrifying.” He told her. “For a fourteen-year-old.” Rey just stared up at him. She shouldn’t be able to do things like this, she was barely anything, skin and bones with some muscle that made her lithe and graceful. But the fact that she hadn’t had the proper amount of food had stunted her growth for the time being and made her smaller than any normal feared lightsaber wielder. “That was supposed to be a compliment.” 

“Thank you?” Was all Rey could manage. She was tired, and she was delaying the inevitable. She didn’t want to go back to Starkiller Base, so she decided to talk up more of a conversation with Hux than she ever had. “Sorry, I’m not used to conversation.” 

“Don’t worry, neither am I.” His voice was crass and borderline. There was barely any emotion in him when he said it. But there was hardly any emotion in Rey’s voice either when she spoke. The both of them shared some sort of trauma that just made them turn off. Rey leaned down and took the blaster off of one of the Resistance soldiers that she had downed. “Why do you always do that? Take stuff from the dead bodies. Is it a trophy of sorts?” 

Rey shrugged, not really knowing what the most suitable answer would be in this sort of situation. If she said that she wanted them as trophies, she would be fitting in amongst the monsters that she fought so desperately to stand out from, despite the fact that she was wife to the Supreme Leader. If she told him that she took things from dead bodies out of habit, when she was on Jakku it was a very necessary thing to do, he would consider her the dirty scavenging rat that Brendol considered her. So, she just shrugged. “I might need it later,” Was all she said. He seemed to know that she didn’t want to talk about it anymore.

“I wanted to ask you something,” Armitage told her. Rey stared at him, unblinking. “I wanted to ask you if you’re satisfied with your position within the order?” He could be doing this as a test, trying to get her to say no so that he could go back to the Supreme Leader and rat on her. He was the type of person who liked to watch other people get hurt. He got off on that, but Rey knew that that was a side effect of the daily abuse that he got from his father. She nudged into his mind momentarily. 

He was genuinely asking. That left Rey, intrigued to say the least. “Just between the both of us?” She asked. “I really don’t like being here.” She never did. She could get used to the killing and the rush of the power that came with it. She liked that. What she didn’t like is the cause that she was killing for. It was an absolutely disgusting thing, to rule over everything and say that you’re doing something for the galaxy without actually doing anything to help the people. Crime was still rampant. Slavery still existed. People died of sickness every single day, and there was no system set in place to protect them. 

Despite the fact that the First Order claimed to be the better organization. “I can tell,” Hux said. “To be honest I don’t blame you.” The two of them walked through the rubble more, Hux occasionally kicking at the dead corpses that were in his way. “While I do get what the Order is trying to do, I think it’s time for people to die out so the rest of us can ascend the ranks. Fix it. Do what we need to do to get the galaxy in order.” Rey wanted to ask where he was going with this, but she knew what he was going to say next. 

“You want your father dead,” She said. 

There was silence for a moment before he said, “He deserves it.” Rey blinked for a moment. She wondered how badly Snoke would punish her for killing such a high-ranking member of the First Order. 

“How do you think he should die?” 

“I’d love something bloody, but I know that realistically that isn’t the smart way to go about things. It needs to look natural.” 

“You want him to die in his sleep,” 

“No, he could be awake. Choke to death on his soup or something like that, but he needs to die either way.” Rey knew that Brendol Hux was a cruel man. 

“It could be slow,” Rey said, “if you really want him to die. I could make it happen. Slowly make his heart pound harder and harder until he has a heart attack. Make sure that it’s painful. You could watch it happen, too.” She saw the smile flash across Hux’s face, and she knew that she should be disgusted with the fact that she was considering teaming up with one of the very people she considered a monster. 

Now were desperate times though, and she couldn’t really care about morals. She did what she had to do. 

***

**_Five Years Later_ **

Rey had never run so fast in her life. She said that every time she was near certain death. One rather insistent Resistance member had been chasing her for what seemed like an hour, he had successfully shot her once in the shoulder. 

The next thing she knew, something big and large had let go of a tree and swung down, hitting her in the back. She was launched into the air and rolled down a hill where she blacked out.  

She was going to die here.

Rey woke up in pain and possibly dying. She knew that she shouldn't be alive. But someone had seen her fall. Someone had taken her in. 

It was much to her chagrin to find that it was a man in Jedi robes. She tried to get up but the blinding pain from her ribs made her lay back. "Yeah I was going to advise against that." He said. "You had quite a nasty fall." 

 "Yeah, no shit." She coughed. It was the worst feeling ever. "Fuck," 

"You're the Empress, aren't you?" She didn't answer that. "You are." He came forward, he was quite tall, and very muscular. "No judgement from me." He said. "I'm just here to help you because you're hurt."

"Yeah, right." 

Rey was scared. She wouldn't admit it but she was. 

"I'm not going to hurt you. I don't have a side. I just help people in need because that's the Jedi thing to do."

"Right," Rey said. "Because the Jedi are the pinnacle of morality."

He ignored that.

"My name is Ben,"

"Ben Solo? The General's kid?"

The General's kid had gone missing in action a long time ago. When Rey was still a slave. 

"Yes."

"There's no way I'm not getting turned in,"

"She doesn't know I'm here. You're safe here."

Interesting. 

Still, Rey was going to murder Ben Solo and laugh when she killed his self-righteous ass. And why? Probably because he kept going on about how the Jedi order helped people in need no matter who they were and he wouldn't leave her alone. "Can you tell me why you were running?"

“Because I was gonna die."

"And why you broke three ribs,"

"Hit by a log trap."

"It's a miracle you're alive," Ben said. "That kills most men."

"I'm not a man. I can take a little pain."

"You're in a lot of pain right now," He said, "there's no way you're not unless you're in shock."

"I've been through worse."

"I can only imagine," Ben placed a cold cloth on her head. "That doesn't invalidate your pain now though," He got up again, going out of her line of sight. "I have some pain medicine, but not a lot, so it'll have to be used sparingly. Are you in pain right now?"

No shit.

"I'm not taking anything you give me."

"Why?" Silence. "I won't do anything to you." He told her. His voice was soothing and she hated it. "Besides you can barely breathe and can't get up, don't you at least want to sleep?" She did. She was silent for a long time before finally agreeing to what he had asked her. She took the pill, noting after a few seconds that it was not in fact poison.  

She fell asleep not long after that.

***   


_"You are worth nothing,"_ _Unkar_ _Plutt said. "You will not speak, you will not fight back, your soul purpose is to make me money, do you understand?" Rey was told this for as long as she could remember. She nodded._

_"You will meet him today," Plutt said, "the ancient one in charge of the Order. He wishes to take a wife, and since you're the best looking of my_ _girls_ _I'm choosing you. You better hope he chooses you,"_

_"Yes, sir." Was all she could say. She met him that day. The Ancient One with the scarred face who corrupted girls and killed them when they turned eighteen. The Ancient One fell in love with her and her youth, he took her and another girl in as his wives that day. She was tall and broad and well built, with blonde hair that was in a crew cut. She was seventeen. She would die first._

_The both of them were scared beyond their wits, they both got beat together, they both bandaged up their bloody faces and tattered knuckles. "We're going to die here," The blonde would say._

_But Rey had a plan, a plan that should have kept the both of them alive._

 

***   


 

Rey woke up to a dull aching sensation. Ben was there watching her. He looked tired. She still wondered why he was even bothering with her. "You're probably hungry, I have some broth for you."

"Did you poison it?"

"What would I have to gain from that? Besides I didn't poison your pain pill so why would I poison your broth instead?" He was right, but still she was suspicious. He sighed, taking a sip from the broth. When he didn't keel over Rey accepted it. He fed her, which was embarrassing, but he wasn't a dick about it. 

"So, you're not turning me in," Rey said, "what do you want in reward?"

"I don't want anything," He told her. 

Then what could he stand to gain from this? Rey didn't understand. "I just like helping people."

"Right." She said again.

"I don't have a side in this war."

"And yet your mother is the leader of the Resistance." He blinked, looking like this shouldn't be of any issue to Rey whatsoever. "Surely she would've raised you to believe in the cause."

"She did," He said, "but we disagree on our executions, I guess. I'm not much one for fighting. I'm more the healing type."

"So, what happens when your mother comes banging at your door asking if you're hiding a fugitive? What are you going to do then?"

"Tell her you're not here," His voice sounded so genuine, "I don't put defenseless people in danger, no matter who they are. You could be the Empress or just a random nobody, I would've still picked you up and helped you." Rey was about to open her mouth to say something, but she was at a loss for words.

"I need to change your bandages," He said. 

"Get away from me." He grimaced when she wiggled a little and ultimately paid the price for it. 

"This is for your own good." He raised a hand, and Rey felt her eyes start to droop. "Don't be afraid," He told her, "I feel it too." 

She passed out after that.

***

The Empress had a lot of scars. Ben learned that soon when he was changing her wounds. Not all of them looked like they were from war. Some looked self-inflicted. Some were bruises that looked like they were inflicted by someone who she didn’t fight back from. 

***

**_Five Years Before_ **

Rey was only fourteen when she had her first kiss. Armitage Hux was sixteen and a half. Part of her felt wrong, like she shouldn’t be doing this. But this was an infinitely better alternative to Snoke and the artificial insemination he had her undergo over and over again to try and birth a child. She had not successfully carried one to term yet. 

This was different. It wasn’t passionate, but it felt comforting, like they were sealing some sort of pact when they plotted to kill both Snoke and Brendol Hux. Rey didn’t know what she would be getting herself into later. She didn’t know that she would get a hold of the power that she had longed to taste on the battle field. 

She didn’t know that she would get corrupted in such a way that she would long the taste of ash and copper in her mouth and she wouldn’t be able to rest unless she waged war against someone else. Rey became the Empress of the First Order; Supreme Leader was a title that she wanted to shun for the rest of her life. 

She thought that once she had cut Snoke in two, seeing red and heaving, that Hux would say that he wanted to be the Supreme Leader and try and betray Rey. That didn’t happen though, he rushed into the room when the last guard dropped to the floor and grabbed Rey before she could fall. “You did a good job.” He said. He lowered her to the ground. Rey wondered where he had been before. Was he having fun tearing into his father’s dead body? Was he gloating to the milky white corpse she had left in the medbay before coming straight to Snoke? Most likely, that was what he was doing. Hux stroked her hair and she shuddered, there was blood all over her, and she felt like she wanted to throw up. 

She was exhausted, to say the least. “That’s a lot of blood. I’ll call a medbot.” 

“None of its mine.” She started to get up. “Plus, we still have so much to do. We’ll take care of me later. Is your mother okay?” 

“I killed her.” Rey knew right then and there he was a monster. He sounded so happy about the fact that he killed her too. She supposed that now she shouldn’t care though. She was a monster too. She killed and killed and killed, and now that she thought about it, it felt good. It gave her a sense of control that she hadn’t had in a long time. She had been a slave, had been tortured, she deserved to be in control. “She said that I would never amount to things that my father amounted to. Said that I should have been the one to die. I decided that if she hated the fact that I was here and he wasn’t, I would send her with him. It wasn’t hard either.” 

“It’s understandable. Hopefully she’s in a better place.” 

“If she wants to be with my father, she’ll have to rot in hell.” That stuck with her for a while. The rest of the day they spent time reorganizing everything, making people recognize that Rey was the one in control of everything now. People would laugh and scoff at the fact that a fourteen-year-old was taking control, but when she displayed the full strength of her abilities, people understood the power of the dark side. 

Rey founded the new First Order on pain and fear, but it blossomed into something else. She watered the soil with compassion and caring for wanting the galaxy to blossom into something else. Not everyone agreed with her being in charge though. They didn’t like the trail of red that she smeared across the galaxy when she came across slavers seeped into everything like a stain. When someone disagreed with her, she was usually persuasive enough to let them know when it was time to back down before she had to use the threat of the First Order’s might on them. 

That’s where the Resistance came in. The blight in her existence, the never-ending thorn in her side. In the end, she assumed that they would be her downfall, and not because she was going to die by their hand. No, she would sooner die of sheer annoyance because of their persistence than actually die by one of their hand. She assumed that they would be her downfall because of the madness that they inflicted upon her mind. 


	2. recovery isn't fun

**_F_ ** **_our_ ** **_Years Ago_ **

The first time that Rey had ever met someone who actually cared, he left when he realized that he couldn’t save her. The first time Rey had met someone who had cared about her, she had run into Han Solo on Jakku. She had almost gotten free, she had almost gotten everything that she could have ever wanted.

The next time that Rey met the only person who had ever cared about her, she had been the Empress for one year and she was out in battle. She had been shot twice and she was nearly dead when he came to her. “Oh, god. Didn’t think that I would see you out here.” 

“Nice to see you too,” She coughed. She could taste blood on her lips. The metallic taste should’ve scared her. It did not. 

***

**_Four Years Later_ **

Rey drifted in and out of consciousness for a while. She wasn't sure how long, but when she was awake, she felt more nauseous than anything. She closed her eyes again, her head feeling like it was about to burst. "Ah, you're awake again." He said. "You sleep like you're dead by the way." 

"Why didn't you just let me die?" 

"Oh good, you're being dramatic too, you must be getting better." Rey raised her arm, making a choking motion towards Ben, she didn't actually go through with it though.  "You only proved my point further." 

"Fuck you,"

"Thanks for the offer but no thanks. You have three broken ribs and I don't think that'd be best."

" _Fuck off,"_

"Do you need to pee?"  _Yes._

"No," 

"Are you sure about that?"

"I'm going to kill everyone you love and then laugh when you cry about it."

"I'll take that as a yes, you need to pee." 

"Fine," 

"I have a bedpan," He handed it to her. "I'll leave. Trust me. Cleaning that out is a lot grosser than going in it." Rey's face burned, but he left and she really had to go. She had no other choice but then to wrestle with her pants and then relieve herself. She did her best to cover up without aggravating her injuries and Ben came back in to take the bedpan. 

She was granted another fifteen minutes of peace before he came back in. "You look great," He said. 

"To be honest, at this point killing me would have been kinder."

"Sorry to disappoint." He said. "But you should know by now that I'm not going to kill you." The more he said that the angrier she got. This was so stupid. If she could get up herself, she would probably kill him. "How about this," He said, "you drop the act of being the angry Empress who could kill me with one look and just be friendly. It's a lot easier."

***

_"Smile more," Plutt hissed at her. "He will never take you if you scowl like that, it makes you look ugly. Faking being friendly is easier."_

_"Then why don't you take your own advice and fake being friendly?" Rey said. "It'll make you less ugly." It was raining that night. The storm seemed to rage and pour even harder when she said that._

_"You'll be paying for that." He told her. She knew she would._

***

**_Four Years Before_ **

**_“_** How’d you get here of all places, kid?” 

“Just doing my duty,” She said. She wondered if he would be accompanied by the General, she wondered if he was going to turn him in. Rey tried her best to get up and winced. She was fifteen years old and already accepting the fact that she was going to die.

“Lay down, I have a medkit.” He was getting out anesthetics from his kit when she said no. 

“No,” 

“What? Kid, you need this.”

“No, not anesthetics. Do you have any bacta?” He did. He applied it to her wounds and she got up, nearly coughing up a lung. “I have to go.” She told him. “Thank you for saving my life, that’s a lot more than most people would do.” She left him before he could say anything. It was easier to get lost in the firefight. Ash blown up and kicked around as they fired at each other. 

Hux found her though and brought her up to the medbay. “You are the hardest person to kill.” He clucked his tongue. 

“Don’t sound so disappointed.” 

“I’m not,” He actually sounded offended that she thought he wanted her to die. “I’m just saying that you’re good at this. Good at fighting. You need to let the medbots take care of you now though.” 

“I need to get back out there, fight with my people.” 

“We should save the valor and stupidity for later.” He said. He grabbed her and pushed her down on the bed. “Rest now.” She didn’t get to reject the anesthetics a second time. The pain made her pass out before then.

**_***_ **

"Right," Rey said, "so you just want me to fake get along with you?"

"Hell, maybe you'll actually learn to get along with me." He told her, "Believe it or not all Jedis are prudish or moralistic assholes. Some of us are pretty cool."

If rolling her eyes didn't hurt so much Rey would do it. "That sounded lamer than you could imagine." Ben shrugged. It was the start of something different, where Rey and Ben coexisted in a bit of peaceful annoyance together. It was like that for a while. He tended to her wounds and talked and she just tuned him out for the time being. She drifted in and out of sleep, nightmares permeating her mind the entire time. "Are you okay?" Ben finally asked her after a while. She wasn't sure how much time had passed. "Do you need something?" 

She didn't say anything for the longest time, her cheeks burning. "I'm fine," She said. 

"You've been having nightmares." 

"I always have nightmares,"

"Do you want to talk about it?" 

"Why would I talk to you?" 


End file.
